It's Natural to be Afraid
by Amderus
Summary: A retelling of ME3 along with a continuation of the story. This is a FemShep and Liara story. Alia Shepard & Liara T'Soni try to rebuild their relationship amid the Reaper invasion, but the choices each have made in the last two and a half years have changed who they were. Rated for language, violence and adult situations.
1. Chapter 1

Note: When playing ME2 Lair of the Shadow Broker & ME3, Liara's reaction to wanting to restart their relationship felt unnatural. It seemed to come down to Liara saying, "I know you've been dead for two years, and I seemed uncomfortable with our relationship when you for saw me on Illium. But do you want to get together now?"

Then after you agree with her nothing happens, and only after major events do Shepard and Liara talk about their relationship.

I understood this why this was like that in the game, but it got me thinking, how would they work things out?

So this is my attempt to put down the thoughts and motivations of both Shepard and Liara, and how what they have been thru, has damaged them both.

Please read and review if you like, any feedback will be welcome.

Thanks.

Chapter One: Last Known Surroundings

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_I should have never turned myself in. It's been six months that I've been stuck here, and not a goddamned thing has been done. _

Alia Shepard thinks to herself with a sigh, she began drying herself off from the shower she just took. She ran her hand thru her dark red hair, checking on how it was growing since she woke up almost bald, from what Miranda told her, her hair had just started to grow back a few weeks before she was forced to wake up from her two year death. It was now about neck length and was starting to even out.

Alia was never one to really look at herself in a mirror; in recent months it got harder for her to look at herself; she avoided the mirror for weeks at a time. Shepard was surprised how different she looked from the last time she check herself. She was a tall woman, just over six feet tall, with a muscular figure, that of a person whose job requires a lot of activity and not of a person who was addicted to working out. Her skin was a shade of olive, slightly darker then usual; since this is the longest period of time she has spent on a planet in over five years. Shepard's skin was also crisscrossed with scars, the older ones having faded to match her skin tone just changing the texture. A knife wound on her abdomen from Mindoir, a burn on her shoulder from Akuze. Her most recent scar stood out the most, a three inch scar on her forehead just above her left eye, courtesy of a console on board the Normandy. It was fading as well, but still a light pink that stood out on her darker skin. Shepard rubbed the scar on her forehead and laughed a bit.

_I start a fight at the Collectors home world, and damn near knock myself out and give myself a concussion before I even get my feet on the ground. I have the best luck._

Alia finished dressing and went into her living area; she grabbed a datapad and started to look thru book titles. Shepard has been held in Vancouver under arrest since she turned herself into the Alliance six months ago. In an instant, Alia lost everything she'd been working for since she joined the Alliance, her ship, rank and even her Specter status. Even her current "accommodations" weren't her own doing, Anderson's and Hackett's good word got her house arrest; else she would have either thrown into the brig, or just handed over to the Batarians. She even got a liaison, Lieutenant James Vega, courtesy of Anderson.

Officially, Shepard is to be held until she is brought before a military tribunal, they already stated what she is being charged with within two days of turning herself in, going AWOL, illegal procurement of Alliance material & genocide. The AWOL charge was dropped due to her being listed as KIA; apparently you can't go AWOL if you're dead. The illegal procurement charge came from the fact that some of the weapons Cerberus provided her were in fact stolen from the Alliance. So when she turned herself in and handed over the Normandy, she also gave the Alliance a ship full of evidence to use against her.

After two weeks on earth, Shepard realized that she was going to be stuck here for a while. Officially she was to be held until a military tribunal was to decide how many life sentences she was to serve. In actuality, the Alliance was dragging their feet. Alliance brass didn't want to admit any fault regarding the Batarians, and politically, since they removed them selves from the Council, there wasn't anything the Batarians could do other than empty threats war.

Her quarters weren't huge, but it was the size she had been accustomed to living in. It was slightly larger then her cabin on the Normandy. The extra size came from a small kitchen, which must have been someone idea as a joke considering the only thing she could cook was a MRE. She had floor to ceiling windows that allowed her to look out at the Vancouver sky line. The biggest issue with her room was the silence. Alia had spent years of her life on board one ship or another after she left Mindoir and a ship is never silent. You can always hear the life support hissing or the engine humming or people moving about, but it's never as quiet as planet side can be.

So for six months all Shepard did was hit the gym for an hour a day, talk to an assigned shrink twice a week, read books approved by said shrink (which weren't many), and think. All of the unbidden and unwelcome thoughts and doubts running thru her mind, remembering the friends she's lost, the deaths she was responsible for and, most of all, Liara.

The pain familiar pain begins to spread in her chest as Liara enters her thoughts for what seams to be the thousandth time today. Shepard and Liara didn't exactly part on the best foot, but a step in the right direction. Before Alia died, their relationship was beginning to turn serious. So much so that she was looking into Bondmate rituals and they were discussing their future together. Shepard understood that she had been dead for two years and that everyone moved on. The hardest part was that she didn't, when Alia woke up in that Cerberus station, she felt like the same person she was two years before. She didn't even believe Jacob and Miranda when that told her how much time had passed. Liara was, understandably, less then willing to start up where they left off. She had asked Shepard to give her some time, to let her understand what she wanted and what she was feeling, Alia was willing to wait for Liara.

Before Shepard was detained, she told Hackett to get Liara to research what they were going to need to fight the Reapers. The Admiral said he would give her whatever she asked for. Last Shepard heard was that Liara accepted Hackett's offer and was working with him.

Shepard sighed to herself and looked at the overcast Vancouver sky.

_I wonder what Liara is doing right now…_

A knock came from the door behind her. Alia turned around and dropped the datapad she wasn't reading on her bed.

"Come in."

The door opened and Vega walked in to the room. Vega was several inches taller the Shepard and weighed at least 100 lbs more, and she was no light weight herself. From her time with Vega, she learned that his favorite past time was working out. While she worked out to stay in shape during her down time, Vega actually enjoyed the activity.

"Hey Commander."

"You know I'm not a Commander anymore." Shepard replied bitterly.

Vega grinned slightly.

"Yeah whatever you say Commander."

Vega's grin was infectious.

"What can I do for you Lieutenant?"

His grin got wider and Shepard sighed to herself for giving him such an easy one.

"Oh, you know, this and that would be nice. But it's going to have to wait; Anderson wanted me to bring you to him."

"What's going on?"

XXXXXXXXX

Liara was sitting in the mess hall of the Alliance Mars Research Facility, eating a simple lunch and reading her latest findings on her datapad. She had just forwarded her initial report to Admiral Hackett. It looked to be a Prothean weapon developed to destroy the Reapers, but there was no evidence if it was ever built or if it would even work. It was all they had to go on so far. Liara put the datapad down and pinched the bridge of her nose, a habit she picked up from Shepard from their time together. She could feel a headache forming behind her eyes. It had been over twenty-four since she had slept and it was catching up to her.

_Alia wouldn't be happy if she knew how much I was working._

A small smile formed on her face at the thought of Shepard.

Shepard had been willing to give Liara the time she needed. Certainly more than they both were expecting, after Shepard's incarceration. But it gave her the time she needed to think. Liara was scared; the pain she had felt when Alia died was on par with the death of her mother, except she had lost her only support when Shepard was killed.

Liara thought she had moved on after Alia's death, now she wasn't so sure. She had been stuck in the moment she saw the Normandy destroyed; she had even blamed herself for a little for not being there for Shepard. She shook those off as irrational, but those feeling were still there.

Liara shook her head, feeling the pain settle behind her eyes. The headaches had been common for her, taking stims to stay awake for days at a time, was not a healthy habit to maintain. With her report sent to Admiral Hackett, Liara decided now would be a good time to get some rest. She collected her things and began heading to her quarters, her mind focused on Alia. She had accepted that still had strong feelings for Shepard, in retrospect, those feelings never really went away.

And all it took was to see Alia back from the dead to figure that out. Liara thought somewhat bitterly.

Liara wasn't sure where their relationship would go from here; she and Shepard will still have to work things out. But she knew that she at least wanted to try.

As Liara entered her quarters and began to undress, the lights went out and the emergency back up kicked on. Seconds later she could hear weapons fire and screaming.

XXXXXXXXX

Following Vega out into the hallway, Shepard noticed two things, the armed guards that normally stood outside her door were nowhere to be seen and the hallway was full of activity. Personal were walking with purpose, others were running yelling for others to make a hole. It was like someone kicked a bee hive. To Shepard this could only mean one thing, war. But the question was against whom?

The estimate Shepard had was that it would take close to a year for the reapers to make it to the closest mass relay and began their attack. It could be the Batarians, but they didn't have a military that could stand up to the Alliance. They were vengeful, but not suicidal. But considering how many people she killed with the Alpha Relay, they might be desperate.

All things considered, Shepard hoped it was the Batarians. They still needed time to prepare for the Reapers.

At the end of the hall, Alia saw Admiral Anderson round the corner and head straight for them. It had been a while since she had seen Anderson; he would stop by every month or so to talk to her, let her know how everything was going. The look on his face was grim.

"Shepard."

"Anderson. The Batarians or Reapers?" Alia replied as the three of them head back the way Anderson came from.

He eyed her briefly before answering.

"We're not sure, but we don't think it's the Batarians. There were minimal ship movements the last few weeks. Ten hours ago, they went dark. According to Hackett, we are losing contact with major colonies. He's mobilizing the fleets now and began evacuation of Arcturus Station."

"Shit! Admiral, it has to be the Reapers. No way the Batarians could hit us like this."

"I agree. The defense committee is gathering now, they wanted to talk to you."

"Oh, so they had me locked up for six months, took away my rank and my ship, all so when the Reapers show up they can talk to me about our defense." Alia said full of anger and more than a little bitterly.

"Goddammit Shepard! You destroyed a mass relay, that in and of itself almost got humans ejected from the Council! The pressure to just hang you out to dry was immense. No one wanted to start a war with the Batarians so we couldn't make it look like there were not consequences for what you did."

"I only did that to stop the Reapers from walking straight in, we needed time." Alia replied looking down at her feet. Sounding more like she was trying to convince herself more than Anderson.

"I know." Anderson said softly, and put his hand on Shepard's shoulder. "A lot of us do in fact. Speaking of rank…"

Shepard looked back up at Anderson as he activated his Omni-tool and brought up personal records.

"I'm giving you full re-instatement into the Alliance and returning you to the rank of Commander." He then reached down into his pocket, pulled out her tags and handed them to her.

"Let's go Commander."

Shepard stood there shocked for a few seconds before she began following Anderson again.

"Aye, aye sir"

As they approached the committee's chambers, Ashley Williams was stepping out. Anderson turned to Vega.

"You can stay out here and wait for us."

"Yes sir" Vega looked a little disappointed that he wasn't going to be able to see what was going on, for about the three seconds until he noticed Ashley coming towards them. Ashley saluted Anderson.

"Admiral."

"LC, you can stay here as well. We can catch up a bit." Anderson responded as he opened the doors to the Committee's chambers.

Alia didn't care much for catching up with Ashley. Aboard the original Normandy they never really saw each other eye to eye, and she made it known that she did not approve of Shepard "consorting" with an alien. Shepard then made it known that she didn't "give a thousand flying fucks" that Ashley didn't approve of her love life, and if it was a problem for her Shepard would find a place for her to transfer. From that point forward they kept their talks all business, they would work with each other but that's it.

Then there was horizon. Ashley seemed personally insulted that Shepard would "fake" her own death and not tell Ashley about for two years. Shepard had to make it clear to Ashley that there was nothing "fake" about how she was spaced, and as soon as Ashley heard Cerberus was involved with bringing her back Ashley turned from insulted to openly hostile. Shepard then told her to fuck off and left Ashley on horizon. To say they were not on good terms was putting it lightly in Alia's book.

"Um… Shepard." Ashley said, not sure how to address her.

"Williams." Alia responded coldly as she walked past Ashley without much of a glance and entered the chambers.

As the door closed Vega approached Williams.

"Do you know the commander?"

"I used to." Ashley responded.

The Defense Committee's chamber was set up almost like a courtroom. Ceiling was maybe ten meters high, the left and right sides of the room were lined with manned workstations. Screens were suspended three meters or so above where everyone was working. In front of Shepard and Anderson was a stage with a very wide crescent shaped desk. At the desk were six men and woman, all admirals. Behind them was a window over looking Vancouver. Six sets of eyes focused on Alia.

"Shepard." A woman on the committee began. Anderson cleared his throat.

"It's actually Commander, I have decided to offer re-instatement to Shepard" Anderson said. A few members looked shocked at this, but none voiced any concerns at the moment.

"Commander, as Admiral Anderson has briefed you, ten hours ago all contact with the Batarians was lost. Shortly there after we began to lose contact with colonies closest to Batarians space. Over the last several hours we have been losing contact with several colonies, the projections say that whatever this is, it's headed to Earth. Ten minuets ago we lost contact with Arcturus Station."

"Admiral Hackett?" Anderson jumped in, this obviously being news to him.

"Last we heard was he was beginning evacuations of Arcturus Station and preparing the fleets. As of now, the sol system is cut off from standard communication."

"What we need to do is to evacuate any populated area, starting now." Shepard began. "Give the fleets in orbit orders not to engage them directly."

"Wait. Then you know what we are up against?" A man on the committee asked.

"Do I need to spell it out for you? The Reapers are here, we ran out of time! We need to sal-" Shepard was cut off by a woman at one of the workstations.

"We just lost contact with Luna base!"

"The moon?! Why haven't we heard anything from the third fleet?!"

"They must be jamming the coms." Shepard offered a guess.

"The UK spaceport is reporting in that they are under attack! They have a visual!"

On the large screen a grainy video began to play. It showed a Reaper, about the same size as Sovereign a long with half a dozen smaller ones, attack the spaceport. They only seemed to be attacking ship and any sort of defenses that were visible. On the bottom of the screen an estimated deaths tally was raising, but not as fast as one would think with such wanton destruction.

"They're cutting off our defenses and our ability to escape! They're going to trap as may people as they on here so they can harvest us."

"But that would take years!" Someone shouted.

"They have time, we don't. We have to evacuate as many people as we can and plan a counterattack." Shepard stated.

Behind her Anderson was trying to get Williams on the com, he was having limited success but was able to get a message across.

At that moment, there was a rumble that filled the air and could be felt thru the building. Thru the overcast sky a Sovereign class Reaper was lowering itself into the middle of the city. Everyone stood in stunned silence.

"Oh my God." Someone whispered as The Reaper fired some sort of energy weapon at the near by spaceport.

"Back away! Get a way from the win-" was all Shepard was able to get out before the Reaper fired on their building. The beam hit ten meters from where Shepard was standing, right in the middle of where the defense committee and their aids were standing. The beam vaporized those nearest to the glass and those that were in the beam. The other were severely burned and thrown from the shockwave of super heated air. The shockwave hit Shepard square in the chest and threw her backwards, her head cracking the concrete wall.

In an instant, the world ceased to exist.


	2. Chapter 2

Note: I just wanted to say thanks to everyone who followed, favorite and reviewed my first chapter. I do appreciate your support and being interested.

I'm also sorry it took so long to get the second chapter up. It had been a busy two weeks at work and I just didn't have the time to write. I also got stuck on how to write out this chapter with out it being boring, so while I'm not 100% happy with how it turned out, it's the best I could come up with. Hopefully it won't take anywhere as long to get chapter 3, and chapter 4 is almost completely written.

If you see any issues, spelling, grammar or it's stupid, please let me know.

Thanks again.

Chapter 2: Catastrophe…

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As soon as Liara heard the first gunshot, she was in motion, rushing to remove her lab clothing. Moving into her small bedroom, she headed to a secure drawer and unlocked it with a signal from her Omni-tool. The drawer contained a set of light armor and a Predator pistol. The armor was mostly white with some blue accents. Liara had this set of armor, along with a heavier set being stored on the Citadel, made for her a few months ago. This set was made to be portable and so it didn't obviously look like armor, but what it lacked in protection it gained in flexibility and the fact that it could be worn in public without drawing attention.

It took her less than a minuet to dawn her armor, but the weapon fire was now sounding closer. Liara found it strange that no alarm had been raised yet, that meant that security had been disabled or hacked. Either way she had to find a way to the Archives. The Archives were the most secured location at the Mars Research Facility. She could hold out there until help arrived or she could collect the data and sabotage the archives in order to prevent the data from falling into the wrong hands.

Liara returned to the door of her quarters, in all a minuet and thirty seconds had pasted since she heard the first shot. She focused for a moment, willing a biotic barrier around herself. Liara said a small prayer "Goddess, protect me" and opened the door. The gunfire was close now, coming from down the hallway to her right. From the same direction she could hear voices as well; these were not sound of panicked shouts but calm conversions. The voices sounded wrong, augmented, they were possibility using something to conceal their voices. Liara began a quiet run away from the voices coming towards her, whoever they were they weren't Alliance.

"There she is!" one of the voices say as they caught sight when they rounded to corner. Liara switched to a full sprint, stealth no longer an option, trying to make it to some cover before they were able to bring down her barriers. Liara felt rounds hitting her back, as they hit a pressure began to build in her head, her focus waning. By the time she made it to a support that she could use a cover, she had taken several more hits, her focus was paper thin and the pressure in her head was almost unbearable, her barrier was weak and would not stop the next hit she took. From her cover she eyed her attackers and fired a few rounds down the hallway. There were four of them two of them had moved down the corridor while the other two stood back to provide cover fire, they wore silver and yellow-gold color armor. The pressure in Liara's head was receding, and her focus was now easier to maintain, she could feel her barriers strengthening.

"Dr. T'Soni!" one of the attackers called, maybe a woman, but it was hard to tell with the distortion.

"We do not want to hurt you; if you surrender we promise not to harm you." The two closest to her were not firing, but they were pointing their weapons in her direction. The other two in the rear started to move up. Liara put her hand out of cover, her fingers spread showing that she had nothing in them. The two that were advancing immediately stopped and raised their weapons. Liara stepped out of cover out of her cover; her hands raised and stretched out in front of her in a universal form of surrender. The attacker closest to her stood up and began to approach her, still pointing his weapon at her. Once he was a few feet out of cover, Liara focused on him, and sending signals to specific muscles in her arms and hand, she closed her hand into fists. A foot in front of and just to his left a singularity formed, Liara turned and ran down the hallway. The singularity picked up the attacker, he screamed in surprise and his comrades opened fire on Liara's retreating form. Several rounds hit the attacker trapped; the others were thrown off course traveling thru the singularity.

As Liara rounded the corner of the hallway, she practically ran into another attacker that was trying to flank her. She lifted her hand and a sent a stasis field at him, he froze mid stride. Liara fired two shots with her pistol into his face, two holes formed in the middle of the helmet. The stasis field cut out and the flanker fell to a heap. Liara recognized the symbol on the left breast of her attackers, it belonged to Cerberus. She knew that Cerberus had a "capture or kill" order out on her, and it looks like that hasn't changed. It was strange was that their soldiers were using vocal maskers, but they had their insignia on their armor.

Liara continued her escape, trying to lose the squad that was behind her and not run headlong into another. Behind her, Liara could hear the Cerberus squad was dogging her. Offshoots of the corridor have been locked down, keeping her from circling her pursuers or losing them. Occasionally she would throw a singularity in the middle of the corridor to slow them down, force them to give her some breathing room.

Liara rounded a corner when suddenly the door ahead of her shut; her feet skidded as she tried to reverse her direction. Cerberus obviously now had control of security and they were trying to box her in, trap her. Behind her, the door Liara just ran thru shut, she was trapped in 5 meter long corridor. Liara had few options, she could try to put up a fight, but this would more then likely end up with her being killed and there was no telling how many Cerberus troops would be waiting for her, or she could surrender and bide her time until she could escape.

Liara sighed to herself; she couldn't do any good if she got herself killed here. She set her pistol on the floor and put her hands on top of her head. Tilting her head back in frustration, she saw something that gave her a spark of hope. An air vent, one of the larger ones what spread out thru the complex. Liara scooped up her pistol from the floor and attached it to her hip.

She raised her right hand, she wanted to create a focused warp field at the vent to make a hole large enough for her to fit thru. Within seconds she had dissolved enough of the vent for her to fit. Liara jumped and grabbed the lip of the vent. As Liara pulled herself up the door she originally entered opened, the three soldiers that had been following her entered the room. She was three-fourths the way into the duct when she felt one of them try to grab her foot. His grip slipped off of Liara's shoe and she was able to pull herself completely in the air duct, bullets followed her. She scrambled forward, trying to get to get deep enough where a stray bullet or a ricochet would hit her. It was a large duct, just over a meter tall and one and a half wide.

Once Liara was out of harms way she brought up her Omni-tool and tried to decide on her destination. She would not be able to make it to the Archives; Cerberus had already taken over to much of the facility for that to be an option. She wasn't to far from the motor-pool; she could at the very least make her escape.

Liara prayed to the Goddess that help was on the way or the very least that she would be able to make it out.

XXXXXXXXX

Consciousness rushed back to Shepard, her eyes snapped open in a panic. Her head felt like it was filled with foam but it was clearing quickly. Alia began picking herself off the floor, her limbs feeling distant and numb. As her head cleared, Shepard began to register what her senses were telling her. Her eyes stung from the smoke, she could see bodies and body parts around her. Her ears were ringing, the blast that threw her was deafening, but she could hear the battle and destruction outside. She could hear the same rumble she heard when that first Reaper descended into the city, over and over again. Then there was the smell. Shepard had smelled this before, smoke, burnt and cooked flesh, blood & bodily waste, it smelled like a battlefield.

"Shepard!" Alia heard Anderson call out to her. As Anderson moved over to Shepard he favor his left leg over his right, but other than that he seem no worse for ware. He help Alia to her feet, she could feel something warm running down the back if her neck.

"Hold still and let me have a look at that bump." Anderson said. He examined the back of her head.

"Scalp wound, bleeds like crazy but it's nothing serious. It looks like you split you head on that thick skull of yours." He spread Medi-Gel on the wound to stop the bleeding.

"How long was I out?" Shepard said, finally able to find her tongue as her brain came up to speed.

"Not long, a few seconds maybe. The blast had thrown me across the room, bounced off the desk there." He gestured to the left side of the room. "Hurt my leg a bit, but I'll live. You?"

"Cracked my head is all, I should be good." The fog in her head was clearing, but she had one hell of a headache.

Shepard looked around the room. The Reaper's blast had killed everyone but Anderson and herself. The door they had entered was buried with rubble and there was no telling how bad the damage was outside the door.

"We need to get to the Normandy, to the Council. I got a hold of Williams, told her to prep it for dust off." Anderson told her. He was searching some of the bodies and body parts. He found a standard issue pistol and some thermal clips and handed them to Shepard. Moving to the next body, he found one for himself.

Alia checked her weapon and activated her Tech Armor. Glowing shield plates formed around her body, she then focused a warp barrier under the shield plates, and lastly she activated a second shield. This combination of shield-barrier-shield was very resistant to all but heavy fire. She felt more comfortable now with her Tech Armor up , though she still felt kind of exposed without her physical armor, so this would have to do.

Their only choice was to head outside onto the terrace and see if they could make it around the damage. Outside they could see the Reaper that attacked them; it was firing at different targets but not randomly. Tracer rounds could be seen hitting the Reaper, it would then retaliate and fire back and the tracer rounds would stop. It seemed to stick with her theory that, at least for the time being, they were just reducing earth's defenses and chances for escape.

On the terrace they could see a path that would take them around the building and in the direction of the dry docks. Below Shepard could see Alliance members trying to evacuate the building and care for the wounded. It was hard to know that few, it any, would live thru this. Alia and Anderson made their way around the out side of the building, at one point jumping from the terrace to a near by roof top. An Alliance fighter roar passed them, followed by a Reaper fighter. The Alliance fighter seemed to be trying to zigzag between some buildings to lose his tail, unfortunately he or she was hit by the Reaper. The fighter jerked hard to the right, and directly into one of the buildings.

"Look at this! They're cutting thru our defenses like they aren't even there!" Anderson said gesturing to the now burning building.

"We had time Anderson, and most of it was wasted." Alia replied.

They had to keep moving forward, the sound of the battle was changing. As the sound of defense cannons became more infrequent, the sound of assault rifle grew. Objects were streaking thru the atmosphere, at first Shepard thought it was wreckage from whatever may have been in orbit, but the objects fell in groups of two or three. Landing around the Reapers, and whenever a group landed near by Anderson and Shepard could hear a fire fight start of from that direction.

After making their way over one building, down another and thru a couple, they were within sight of the dry docks. The dry docks was a complex converted from an old shipping dock that had been used for the last several hundred years. It's proximity to English Bay made it easy to transport large and heavy materials conventionally, without the need of large Mass Effect generators. The docks handled ships up to cruisers; anything larger would be worked on in spacedocks.

"Admer-" Anderson's Omni-tool cracked to life. It was Williams, the transmission was bad, cutting out almost every other word.

"Almos- mandy! Under heavy fire- God! Give- location!"

"Williams! We are in sight of the dry docks trying to approach! Williams?!" Anderson replied. There was no response other than static and no way of knowing if the transmission got thru.

Shepard and Anderson had made their way to ground level and were in the dry docks shipping yard. To their left was cargo containers stacked three high and on their right was English Bay and the lower docks. They were exposed but heading on the shortest path to the docks, without trying to work their way thru a maze of cargo containers. With just over a kilometer away, they ran passed a wreckage of a gunship. It looked like it had been shot down, but not in bad shape, and there was no movement that showed that there were any survivors.

"Anderson! Maybe we can see if that gunship has a distress beacon we can use to signal the Normandy."

"Good thinking"

As they headed to the downed gunship, they could see an Alliance cruiser began to lift off from the dry docks and align its main canon with the nearest Reaper. The cruiser was in the middle of a retrofit and was far from space worthy, large portions if its armor was missing. The Alliance ship began to fire it canon. The slug, traveling at supersonic speeds, smashed into the rear of the Reaper but it didn't even seem to notice. The Reaper turned to face the cruiser, but not before it got another shot off.

"That cruiser isn't going to be a-" was all Anderson got out before the Reaper fired. A red beam streaked out and slammed into the cruiser. With no shields and next to no armor, the beam punched straight thru the ship. There was a flash of light and the ship folded in on itself as the ship's drive core overloaded, followed by an explosion. The explosion knocked them off their feet, and debris from the ship flew in every direction. The Reaper then went back to taking shots at any defense canons that fired at it.

As Anderson climbed into the wreckage of the gunship, attempting to activate the distress beacon, Shepard kept an eye out for any thing that may attack them. There were the bodies of the two pilots outside of the crash site. One of them looks to have been badly injured in the crash, while the other had been shot several times. Shepard took the assault rifle from the dead pilot, and kept an eye out for what may have killed him. From inside of the wreckage Shepard could hear Anderson talking.

"Normandy, Anderson. We are at a downed gunship by the bay. I am activating its distress beacon."

After a few seconds the reply came in.

"Aye, aye Admiral. We are on our wa-" was all before the transmission got cut off.

From her location, using the gunship as cover, Shepard could see movement on the upper docks. Figures began coming out from the cargo containers. They had been Batarians, their skin was now gray, blue light came from their eyes and mouths, their right arms now ended in some sort of weapon.

"Contact!" Shepard yelled before opening fire with her rifle. Anderson scrambled out of the gunship and took aim at the Batarian-Reapers that were approaching. From the sky objects were streaking down towards them. When they hit the ground there was a small explosion and more of the Batarians appeared. Shepard and Anderson were holding them back, but it was not sustainable, soon they would run out of thermal clips and be over run.

"I'm out!" Anderson yelled.

"Catch!" Alia tossed him her assault rifle and her remaining clips. She pulled out her pistol and began using her biotics. Using throws to keep the Batarian-Reapers at bay and occasionally firing to conserving ammo. Suddenly missiles began striking the upper dock where the Reapers were coming from.

"The cavalry has arrived!" Joker's voice could be heard coming from Anderson Omni-Tool. The Normandy came into view along with three Alliance shuttles. The shuttles landed behind their location, while the Normandy's shuttle bay was opening on a portion of the upper docks that was still intact. Alliance soldiers disembarked from the shuttles and watched the upper docks for movement.

"You need to go to the Council, get their support and fleets. I'm staying here leading the fight." Anderson said gesturing to the Alliance shuttles.

"Bullshit! I'm not just leaving you here."

"Don't make it an order. We don't have a choice; you know what we are up against. Do whatever you have too to get their support, we can't win without it."

Shepard clenched her jaw, he was right. Goddammit, he was right, but it didn't mean she had to like it and they didn't have the time to argue over it.

"Fine. I'll go and try to get the Council to help." Alia grabbed his shoulder. "Take care of yourself Anderson."

"You too, Shepard." Anderson turned and headed to the shuttles, and soldiers pulled back following him. Shepard headed to the Normandy's open shuttle bay; Ashley was standing in the bay watching her approach.

"Shepard." Ashley said as Alia boarded the Normandy.

"It's Commander again." She replied, Ash looked like she was about to say something about that but Shepard cut her off.

"Joker, get us out of here. We need to get to the Citadel."

"What?!" James shouted from the back of the bay. "We're just fucking leaving?! And where is the admiral?"

"Anderson is staying behind to handle resistances here on Earth. We are to get the Council to provide help." Shepard said, her voice calmer then what she was feeling.

"Bullshit." Both Ashley and James said almost in unison. Shepard could feel her temper rising.

"If you don't fucking like it you can both get the fuck off at the Citadel! Until then we have our orders."

"Commander? Admiral Hackett is trying to get a hold of Admiral Anderson. I let him know that you were on board and he wants to speak with you." Joker notified her.

"I'll take it down here." Shepard moved to the back of the bay to the consoles. As she approached Hackett's face appeared on the screen.

"Commander. I was trying to get a hold of Anderson but I take it he's not there."

"No sir. He decided to say on Earth to coordinate the fight. His orders were for us to get to the Citadel and ask the Council for help." Alia explained.

"A sound move, we need the Council if we are to have a chance to win. But before you head to the Citadel I want you to go to the Mars Facility. Dr. T'Soni was doing research there and may have found something promising."

"Liara?!" Shepard could feel her heart pound; excitement, worry and fear filled her. "We're on it."

"Excellent, I'm sending the coordinates now. I'll be in contact after you retrieve Dr. T'Soni." If Hackett saw Alia's excitement about seeing Liara again, he didn't show it. "Hackett out."

"Joker, new plan. Admiral Hackett is sending coordinates for Mars, we're going there first. EDI?" Shepard was moving, she was checking on the weapons and armor available.

"Yes Commander?" EDI replied.

"Is any of my armor still on board?"

"No Shepard. It was removed shortly after the Normandy was impounded. I can have the fabricators make you a new set. Given you measurements have not changed much. But this will take several hours to complete. In the mean time, there is standard issue N7 armor."

"That'll work." The N7 armor wouldn't be as comfortable as a custom fitted set, but she would take what she could get. Alia began striping from her clothes.

She looked over at Ash and Vega, both standing on the other side of the console, looking unsure.

"Well are you going to get ready? Or am I going to Mars by myself?"

Ashley looked like she was about to say something again, then thought better of it. She shrugged her shoulders.

"Yes ma'am."

James, now looking indifferent began to get ready himself. Shepard, now in her bra and panties, pulled out a set of armor for her height and weight. As she placed the armor on the table, a loud growl came from Shepard's stomach. She hadn't eaten in several hours plus she had been using her biotics, Alia was starving. Ashley rolled her eyes and grabbed some high calorie meal bars and an energy drink made for biotics that were kept in the shuttle bay and tossed them to Shepard. Alia give her thanks to Ash, tore into one of the bars. James froze as soon as her heard the growl.

"What the hell was that?" James asked, as slightly shocked look on his face.

"What?" Shepard said thru a full mouth. She was starting on her second meal bar; one was almost never enough for her.

"Ah, never mind." Vega decided to let it go for now. Shepard shrugged, finished her bar and put on her armor.

"Commander? We'll be at Mars in two minuets." Joker notified them.

"Thanks Joker. Ok people, lets go." The three of them boarded the Kodiak shuttle. Liara jumped back into Shepard's mind, and the thought that if the Reapers hit Mars before Earth all that would be left of her would be a crater.


End file.
